, Columnist
Why People Have Had Enough of Lockdowns
Covid-19 rules are becoming too costly to follow for some and too easy to ignore for others.
Closing early for Paris’s Covid curfew.
Photographer: Kiran Ridley/Getty Images EuropeThis article is for subscribers only.
The history of epidemics is rife with examples of society rebelling against tough public-health edicts, such as the breach of plague quarantine in 18th-century Marseille or protests against face masks during the 1918 influenza pandemic. The grim consequence is a fresh wave of deadly infections.
Covid-19’s million deaths may pale in comparison to the estimated 50 million lives lost in 1918, but the cycle risks unfolding again. France, the U.K. and Spain face a triple threat: A jump in cases, a population exhausted by lockdown-induced recession, and rising resistance to tougher measures.